


A Tatooine Tradition

by Floris_Oren



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Father's Day, Gen, Jedi don't do attachments, Semi AU because Bruck Chun made it to knight and has a padawan, Some background on Anakin's time as a slave, Tatooine traditions, Traditions, but that's about the most AU thing of this entire fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-19
Updated: 2016-06-19
Packaged: 2018-07-16 01:12:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7246201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Floris_Oren/pseuds/Floris_Oren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anakin never got to celebrate an important Tatooine Tradition, after a year at the Temple he decides that the time is now. Obi-Wan is just glad Anakin is okay and isn't getting into more trouble.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Tatooine Tradition

**Author's Note:**

> I just wanted to write down some of my Obi-Wan/Anakin feels. And since today is Father's Day, why not. :)

As with all traditions, they tend to start humbly; and grow with importance over the years as families continue them and pass them on to the younger generation. And, as happens when outsiders come in, tradition’s can get warped into something else entirely. 

Shmi Skywalker had always explained Master’s Day to be a bastardization of Father’s Day. A day where children would let their father’s know that they were appreciated. The slaves still practiced it in the traditional fashion. A small, special meal and the father’s of the house always got a small gift. Whatever the family could do. 

Anakin never had a Father; he knew the steps he needed to take to celebrate it but he couldn’t give his good wish to a father that wasn’t his. Shmi knew, and she’d take him to see Grandpa. An old, old slave who’d worked hard his whole life and whom the community took care of because he could no longer work. He wasn’t “free”. But it helped until he passed on. 

They buried him deep in the sand, and every year, Shmi would take him out and Anakin would bury a gift at the site - or what they thought was the site - and have a moment of reflection and then leave. 

 

It was never like what anyone else did.

But, that all changed when he got to the Jedi Temple and he was taught about the Master/Padawan relationship. That he wasn’t a slave at all and could ask for a different teacher if he so wanted, but with Qui-Gon dead and Obi-Wan working through his grief, Anakin knew it’d be a shame on the older Knight if he did ask for another Master. Not that Master Windu wouldn’t have taken him. 

Master Windu had come to Obi-Wan and offered; promised that it wouldn’t be shameful at all and that everyone would understand. Obi-Wan was touched but left the decision up to Anakin. Because Master’s never rejected a Padawan and “taking a Padawan” wasn’t what it meant at all. 

Anakin still didn’t get the fact that he could chose his Master; these people were just all sorts of confused. Qui-Gon had won him and he belonged to the older man until he died and then he belonged to Obi-Wan did no one understand this? 

Still….they never treated him like a slave and eventually he got to a place where he understood that the Jedi were an ancient society with their own traditions and calling anyone older than oneself Master was a sign of respect. Not ownership. 

Obi-Wan had never insisted that he call him that either. 

But, another word popped up, with each passing day, until he’d been at the Temple for a full year and he had looked up the Tatooine calendar out of a fit of homesickness and found out, that Father’s Day was that Coruscant weekend. Anakin didn’t have an allowance like some of the other Padawan’s. Obi-Wan sometimes gave him a few credit’s but since Jedi didn’t put much credence into things, Anakin couldn’t think of anything Obi-Wan needed. 

 

The Temple provided for all of their needs anyway, and there was always the archives who always had the latest holo-drama or book so there wasn’t anything entertainmentwise that he could give to the older man. 

Finally, Anakin sighed. It’d be a paltry offering but no different than what he’d done back home with his mother. So, he found some flexi and other crafting supplies and set to work. 

 

~*~

 

Obi-Wan never would have thought that Bruck Chun would make it to Knighthood. His childhood bully still hadn’t changed. He acted humble in front of the Council and other Knights that had gained Masterhood. But, in front of Obi-Wan, Bant, Garen and Reeft he was still the bully he’d always been. 

Sadly, his own Padawan was suffering from it, Chun’s natural hottiness and holier-than-thou attitude had gotten into the student and had since started in on Anakin. Saluc of V-5 is a tall, lanky blue humanoid looking creature with the wide eyes of a Calamari and the tentacles of an octopus. They flittered about his head like snakes and had little teeth on the end that he used to bit the other Padawans when no one was looking. Anakin lovingly referred to them as Sarlacc babies. 

And seeing as how no one bothered to look it up besides his own friends, it tended to anger Saluc more than it should; but, Anakin and his friends held the idea that he couldn’t learn anything so the joke continued and Obi-Wan was only in on it when a fist fight had broken out in class once. 

Obi-Wan found he appreciated Qui-Gon more after the first fourteen where Anakin hadn’t been able to avoid punishment because Saluc was just like his Master until finally Obi-Wan got fed up because it was the same problem he’d always had and no one had been able to help him. So, he had to do something. 

A quick lightsaber duel where he thrashed Master Chun across the refectory put an end to most of the harassment. 

And all of that led up to the moment Saluc forgot himself and stole the flexi that held Obi-Wan’s Father’s day message. Anakin had been working on it off and on all week. He wanted to do it right, damn it. And Tatooine gifts weren’t thoughtless. They lived too hard a life to not put some thought into what they gave other people. 

He grabbed it out of Anakin’s school satchel; “What’s this, Ana-whine?” he sneered then began to read it. 

“Give it back.” Anakin growled and went for the pad. But Saluc held it up. “Awe, is this for Master Oafy-Wan?” he jeered. 

“That’s disrespectful!” Anakin tried to hold back the anger. He’d been working on it, honest, in his spare time. Sometimes he couldn’t though. It was hard when someone just wouldn’t leave you alone. 

“Awe, are you gonna cry for your daddy?” Saluc then broke the flexi across his knee. It shattered into a few pieces. For good measure he stomped all over it. He laughed then pushed Anakin out of the way before marching out into the hall. No one had seen this interaction because everyone had gone and Anakin was dawdling. 

He wiped his face. He could still put it together. Maybe. 

~*~

Obi-Wan isn’t blind. He might be oblivious sometimes but he knew something was bothering his Padawan. Anakin seemed deflated. As if someone had just popped all the happiness out of him. It was a bit like how they’d gotten on right after Qui-Gon’s death. 

And he wasn’t entirely certain how to fix it. 

He was cleaning up their small living space; Anakin left things all over the place and Obi-Wan merely picked up after the Padawan and put them back in his room. He went to pick up the school bag when bits of broken flexi fluttered out over the floor. Obi-Wan sighed. It was dangerous to have broken flexi in one’s bag. He’d done that once and got an awful cut because of it and Qui-Gon hadn’t let that one go for years. 

Obi-Wan got to his knees to pick the flexi up. He noticed his Name at the top. 

_ Master Obi-Wan… _

On another piece part of a word was legible;  _...ther…. _

“Master! Sorry, I’ll clean ot up!” Anakin pushed Obi-Wan out of the way and started to clean up in a hurry. He did not want Obi-Wan to see what was on the ruined flexi. 

“Don’t cut yourself, Padawan-mine.” Obi-Wan offered. 

Anakin merely nodded his head and continued to clean up. Then he took all the pieces, his bag and raced into his room. Obi-Wan let him go with a heavy sigh. Sometimes, waiting was hard even for a Jedi. 

~*~

Anakin couldn't restart the gift. 

He needed to repair it and he’d gotten all the pieces. There was some flexi glue in his desk. He sighed. He wished Saluc would get his just deserts for once. 

~*~

Saturday dawned earlier than Anakin wanted. And he couldn’t find his Master. It wasn’t unheard of that Obi-Wan liked to spend some time alone on Saturday’s but Anakin was too nervous about his gift that he couldn’t wait for Obi-Wan to come back to their quarter’s. So he took it and went searching. He checked the meditation rooms first, sometimes Master’s liked to gather together on the slow mornings to meditate. Obi-Wan wasn’t with any of the groups. Which was good because those meditations could go on all day if they wanted. 

Next he checked the archives, all over, no one had seen his Master so the next place he’d gone was the outdoor garden. They were open to Coruscant with a thin netting over top. No one was there, not even Knights looking for a bit of peace to neck for a while. 

Anakin sighed and tried the four spires, still nothing, then he made his way to the Room of A Thousand Fountains. He just came across Obi-Wan coming out. He grinned and ran up to the man. Anakin threw his arms around Obi-Wan and buried his face into the man’s middle. 

Obi-Wan chuckled; “Missed me much, little one?” he teased lightly. 

“Back home,” Anakin spoke into the robes, “we have a tradition, every year the children give their dad a gift of some type. It’s called Master’s Day but in the slave quarters we call it Father’s Day.” 

Obi-Wan draped his arms loosely about Anakin’s shoulders. He didn’t speak. 

“I want you to know that...ah...well…..Happy Father’s Day, Master.” Anakin brought out the repaired flexi. The poem wasn’t long and Obi-Wan was able to read it in seconds. 

“I know attachments are forbidden but, it’s the first time I’ve been able to…” Anakin trailed off, pulled away, about to run in disgrace. 

Obi-Wan is faster, he kneels in front of the ten year old, and brings him close in a hug that is tight and full of affection. Love, Anakin would call it. 

“Thank you, Anakin. I love it.” Obi-Wan whispered. 

Anakin smiled. 

~*~

Darth Vader had the pleasure of going through his old Master’s things. He’d forgotten about that long lost Tradition until Padme had given him a card from their child - before they had died at his hands. 

It was the only time they’d celebrated Father’s Day, it was still a pleasant memory. The way Obi-Wan had held him, like a father. How things ended between them...Vader wasn’t mad about that, not any more, he found it harder and harder to dredge up the darkness. It was now just sadness that filled him. 

And perchance, he found the flexi at the bottom of a drawer, wrapped in some spare robes. He clicked it on. He couldn’t cry, and his breathing didn’t change. He should have had some sort of reaction to the decades old gift. 

But Jedi didn’t do attachments, and Sith used said attachments for their own ends. 

Instead, he crushed the flexi. It fell into more pieces than Saluc ever managed. Vader left the quarters. He didn’t want the memories. He didn’t want the regret. 

~*~

Somewhere in the waste lands of Tatooine. Obi-Wan wished for that flexi, besides Luke, he had nothing to remind him of his Anakin. Of the boy that’d grown into a fine Jedi Knight, and if he had just been wiser, Obi-Wan knew, Anakin never would have turned. 

Father’s day on Tatooine passes in the heat, and the smell of bantha wafts across the desert. They moan and slowly trodd towards what passes as the only watering hole for miles upon miles. The tentacles of the Sarlac pit wave as they pass it by. 

Obi-Wan smiles for a moment, remembering Saluc’s baby sarlac’s. 

Children are far more often cleverer than adults. Obi-Wan mused. 


End file.
